


Southside Howl

by soundofmybones



Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: M/M, Sassy Mickey, Werewolves, new to this sorry...
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-16
Updated: 2017-05-24
Packaged: 2018-11-01 12:31:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,595
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10921854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/soundofmybones/pseuds/soundofmybones
Summary: The first time Ian saw a wolf was on a winter when he was ten. Mickey is a werewolf with an obvious secret until Mandy decides to fuck things up for everyone like she usually does. But does she really?orWerewolf AU starring Mickey as said werewolf and Ian as Ian





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hi guys, so this is my first Shameless fic ever and still deciding whether or not I want to continue it. But I'm deciding to give it a shot and definitely will continue posting if it gets a few kudos or enough people like it...  
> Anyways, it's a new one for me so enjoy!

The first time Ian saw a wolf was on a winter when he was ten. He was fucking around with Lip in the shitty woods of Southside when a wolf with dark brown fur popped out of nowhere. Lip had ran with his tail between his legs leaving Ian to fend for himself. He's not gonna lie, he almost straight up shit his pants. But his sense of self preservation somehow got him to pick up a stick and fight for his life. Although now that he thinks about it, what the fuck was a stick supposed to do to a wolf?

The wolf had stayed still, staring at him with its pale blue eyes. Ian didn't blink, and neither did the wolf. They stayed that way for what seemed to be forever, until the wolf took a step forward. Then another, and another, until it was just within the reach of the stick Ian had held as if daring him to swing it. He almost did. But the wolf got him first.  
In a split second the wolf charged forward, knocking him down and standing tall on top of him. Ian shut his eyes in fear, waiting for the fatal bite and a burst of pain. When it didn't come, he blinks open his eyes to see a nuzzle inches away from his face. _It's... sniffing him?_

The wolf raised a paw and set it on his chest to hold him down before continuing to sniff at him, starting from his hair, to his neck, until it stopped on one of Ian's coat pocket, nudging it profusely. After a while, Ian braved himself to move his arms down to his pocket. The wolf froze, staring at his hand. Ian checked to see what the fuck was so interesting in his pocket for a wolf to attack him for. When he managed to grab it, there was a crumpling sound of plastic. He could swear the wolf's eyes were glowing when he heard the sound.

He took it out to find a half eaten snickers bar.

"You want this?" Ian asked hesitantly. He thought he saw the wolf nod. So he held it out and offered it. He had thought that if the wolf bit his arm off, that was a small price to pay for keeping his life. He was surprised to see the wolf struggling to gently take the bar from his hand, as if trying to be careful to not touch any skin with its sharp teeth. It took him forever to finally bite firmly on the bar.

"Ian!" He hears footsteps coming close and turns to find Lip there with Fiona behind him, carrying a baseball bat.

The wolf takes a look the the two new strangers in the scene.

"Get the fuck away from my brother!" Fiona shouts, swinging her bat. The wolf just barely dodged the bat, jumping away from Ian. It seemed properly freaked out and surprised.

"Don't Fi, it wasn't going to hurt me!" Ian had said in panic, grabbing his sister's arm

"What the fuck Ian?" Fiona had said. The wolf seemed to sense the escalating tension because it nudged Ian one more time with its nuzzle and circled around him quickly before dashing off into the woods. Fiona looked at the wolf and back at Ian weirdly. "What the fuck Ian?"

"It just wanted food," Ian shrugged, before getting up. He gave his brother a dirty look after dusting his pants.

"Hey, I got help," Lip raised both his hands, as if that explains everything. As the Gallagher trio walked home together that night, Ian thought that he learned two new things that day: Lip is an asshole, and maybe wolves aren't that scary at all.

-

"What the fuck do you mean?" Mandy raised her voice, "if this is your way of turning me down, you're in for a life of hell!"

"Jesus christ Mands, why the fuck would I lie to you?" Ian says, obviously upset. Apparently coming out to his bestfriend while she's making a move on him isn't very tactful. He thought he saw a flicker of yellow in her eyes just now. Either ways, he's definitely not in the mood for taking shit right now. Next thing he knows, he's out the door in a flash, sprinting to Kash and Grab. God, he needs a smoke.

"What are you doing here? It's not your shift yet," he hears Linda come up as soon he enters the store. He shrugs at her and goes to the back.

"Hey-" she starts, but was interrupted by a sound of the door opening. In walks the Milkovich crew. Linda glares at them. "Take anything and I will shoot you."

"Chill," one of the older ones say, slightly slurring, "here to buy some gatorade."

He emphasized on the word buy for her. As they went to the cashier, which was manned by a really scared high-looking guy, Ian hears one of them call him.

"Yo."

He turns, recognizing the sound of this Milkovich.

"What's up Mickey?" He asks, still sounding pissed.

“Where’s Mandy?" Mickey asks back.

“Had a fight," he answers shortly. Mickey sensed the animosity in his voice and shrugs before leaving the store with his whole entourage. Ian relaxed his shoulders which he didn't realize was tense. He thought of maybe telling Mandy "i'd rather fuck your brother" but thought better of it. “How’d you know I was with Mandy, anyways?”

There was a pause, Ian looking at Mickey and Mickey looking away for a moment. “Uh, ain’t she always with you?"

Ian shrugs at that, choosing not to read into the situation too much. On his way home after his shift later that day, Ian felt much better, having had a few hours to calm down. He was surprised to find Mandy waiting near Kash and Grab on his way home.

"Hey," she greets.

"Hey," he answers.

"So," she starts, "sorry about just now."

"It's fine," he shrugs. Now that he thought about it, he doesn't really know why the fuck he was so worked up. Mandy's reaction was perfectly normal in Southside.

“I just thought, that you thought I wasn’t good enough for you.”

“What? There’s no way I’d think that,” Ian replies, “I mean, you’re really hot, but I bat from the same team."

"I like you lots as a friend Ian," she says, a smile creeping to her face, "I hope that won't change."

"I like you as a friend too," Ian says back.

"We're okay?" Mandy asks.

"We're okay," Ian smiles, then opens his arms "hug it out?"

"Oh my god, I love you so much," Mandy says, taking up the offer. They stood there for a while, just friendship-hugging each other to death.

“Alright, it’s getting cold out,” he says, when they finally let go of each other. Mandy giggles, “You just get cold easily.”

Ian shrugs. “Fiona’s making dinner today. Steve’s over.” 

“That bitch is shady,” Mandy wrinkles her nose. but follows Ian home anyways. When they do get to the Gallagher house, everyone was sat on the dinner table. As usual, noise filled the whole house, Liam on a brand new babywalker -probably courtesy of Steve- and Kev and Vee was over. 

“What’s the occasion?” Ian asks, taking a seat, Mandy beside him.

“Lip’s going to university,” Fiona replies cheerfully. 

“That’s just an excuse, she just feels like getting everyone together tonight,” Lip interrupts. Ian nods and digs in his food. He already knew Lip was going to university for a while now and he assumes Fiona must have too. Whatever, it’s not like it’ll change his opinion on good food. 

Halfway through eating, Ian hears Mandy’s phone ring. She picked it up in less than two rings. “What’s up bro?”

Ian looks over at her when he hears her silent a little longer than usual. He sees her visibly pale. 

“What’s wrong?” Ian asks, concerned. Mandy looks back at him, a flicker of panic on her eyes that left as soon as it appeared. 

“Uhm,” -she stands up, smiling at him- “gotta go. Family business and stuff. You know how my idiot brothers are. I’ve barely touched my food, you can have it.”

With that, she was out of the house, the rest of the table unbothered. Ian looks at the door weirdly then at Mandy’s coat that she didn’t take out. Yeah the Milkoviches can get into some real crazy shit, but he’s never seen Mandy quite like that before. From across the table, Lip seems to notice his thoughts. “You gonna go after her?”

Ian thinks for a while, then stands up. “Yeah. Leave my fucking share alone.”

Lip shrugs, and with that, Ian grabs his and Mandy's coat and was out the door. 

“Mands, you forgot your coat,” he calls out, and finds no one there. Weird, she was only out a second ago. He decides to jog a little. “Mands?”

When there was no sign of her, he decides the Milkovich house was a good place to find her. When he arrives the house was almost eerily quiet. Not how it gets when there’s “trouble” with her brothers. He walks in through the front door without knocking, because, who the fuck knocks in this neighborhood? The house was completely dark. He hears a weirdly close sounding growl as he steps into the living room. He didn’t expect to find Mandy standing in the middle, stark naked. 

“Ian? What the fuck are you doing here?” she snaps at him as soon as she sees him. Is it just him or did she have weirdly huge teeth in her mouth?

“Just- you left in a hurry. Forgot your coat,” he answers, then stops, “Never mind that, why the fuck are you naked?”

She looks surprised. When he starts to walk over to her to hand her her coat, Mandy shouts, “Don’t come here!”

And for some reason he stops dead on his tracks, like his body refused to move. Just as he stares at Mandy, he hears another growl, impossibly close, then he feels someone from behind him quickly grab his collar and push him against the wall beside him. Caught off-guard, Ian stayed there pressed against the wall long enough to make out who the person was. 

“Jesus Mickey, let him go!” Mandy orders. Mickey stays put, glaring straight into Ian’s eyes. Let’s say that right now, freaked out would be an understatement of how Ian feels. 

“Why the fuck is he here?” Mickey shouts back at her without looking away. Ian looks back at him with daring eyes after regaining his composure. He was more than freaked out, but that doesn’t mean that anyone in the room needs to know. 

“He followed me here.”

Just as Ian opened his mouth to speak he hears a ruffling noise before what looked like the shadow of a dog leap up from behind the couch in front of Mandy towards her. The next moment was a blur. Mandy screamed, and in a flash, the arm on his collar was gone leaving him to drop to the ground. The next thing he knows, Mickey was between Mandy and the dog, the dog’s teeth sinking into an arm that he held up for protection. 

“Shit!” Ian hears Mickey swear loudly. The next second, he hears the dog whimper before dropping to the ground. The room turned silent, Mandy panting on the ground from the shock and Mickey throwing aside what looks like a needle to the ground with his other arm. 

“Shit,” Mickey says again, breaking the silence. With that, Mandy recovers quick, scrambling up to look at Mickey’s arm. “Mick, your fucking arm-“

“Jesus, put some clothes on will you!” he recoils back, flailing his bloody arm at his naked sister. He walks away trying his best not to look at his sister, and utterly grossed out. He leaves the room with, “Imma go and grab a rope."

“Well, fuck you too, Mick,” she frowns and walks over to the couch to pick up a used shirt and put it on. She walks over to Ian -who was still down in a corner of the living room- and looks down at him.

“You alright?” Mandy asks, holding an arm out for Ian to grab, “Sorry ‘bout that.”

Dumbfounded, he grabs the arm, gets up, and without thinking starts asking, “What was-“

“No questions, Red,” he hears a voice interrupt him. Mickey appears from nowhere with a rope in hand, his arm still red with blood, while approaching the huge dog and tying it up effortlessly. 

“Come on, Mick! It’s just Ian,” Mandy complains folding her ams stubbornly.

“Yeah, I get it, it’s just Ian. Ian who’s really hot, my boyfriend and best friend, and sooo amazing,” Mickey mocks before glaring at his sister as he throws himself on the worn out couch in front of him, “and if I recall it’s also Ian Gallagher who lives with around five hundred and seventy three other Gallaghers, which all happens to come from a piece of shit Frank Gallagher. If Frank’s loose mouth is anything to go by, I’d say that no, it’s not just Ian.”

“Fuck you, I’m nothing like Frank,” comes out of Ian’s mouth before he could stop himself. Well, so much for proving him wrong. 

Mickey just raises an eyebrow at him as a response. Ian might be imagining it but it looked almost like a challenge. 

“We can tell Ian,” Mandy demands, putting her foot down.

“Shut up and be happy I haven’t already shoved a knife down his throat when I saw him,” Mickey says, ignoring her and downing an open can of beer. 

“You wouldn't just go around killing everyone who happens to catch us at the wrong time,” Mandy says in return. Mickey just shrugs. “Wouldn’t be the first time.”

Something in his tone tells Ian that he was being serious, which he takes as his cue to leave. “Right Mands, I came to make sure you were okay, which you are now. So I’ll just, leave.”

Mandy refuses to look away from Mickey for another thirty seconds before finally acknowledging Ian. “Fine.”

“I’ll see you tomorrow alright?”

“Yeah, I’ll see you tomorrow,” she says, her tone softening, “good night.”

“Good night,” Ian says back with a hug. He slips one last glance at Mickey before finally leaving. For some reason, he’s got a feeling that the other boy did the same in the millisecond before he’s completely out.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello guys! So it seems some people do like this fic, so here's another one  
> I haven't had time to read write some more but here's a small chapter continuing the last. I'll probably update around once a week so hang around :)  
> This fic is completely unbeta-ed so apologies for the mistakes, they're all my own...  
> I hope you guys enjoy!

“This conversation is _not_ over,” Mandy states stubbornly from across the room. Mickey yawns at that. 

“Well my day is. ‘Night,” he stands up to go to his room. He spares a look resembling pity to the tied up wolf in the corner of the room before looking back at his sister. “Since you brought gingerboy here, you get to keep watch and stay on the couch tonight.”

Mandy’s glare didn’t falter. “You can’t keep this secret between us forever, Mick.”

Mickey ignores her, knowing that full well, but at the same time not willing to admit it. He knows the obvious reasons why absolutely no one should ever find out about this. Heck, he’s spent a good chunk of his life keeping it that way. He’s also sick of having to spit out the same old cliched, most bullshit sounding phrase of “it’s for your own good” to his siblings. Mandy should understand that without him having to tell her by now. So why the fuck does she have to be so god damn persistent about this one?

He slams the door behind him and slumps on his bed. 

“Fuck,” he winces as he feels his bitten arm throb. He looks at it and stubbornly wills for the pain to fade. Which it doesn’t. So he gets up tiredly and goes to the bathroom. He goes over to the sink and turns on the water, watching as the almost dried blood on his hand washes away. He gives it a second and watches the wound heal like it was never there to begin with. He turns off the water, dries his arms off and jumps back to his bed. 

Today hasn’t been the best day for Mickey. On top of Jamie almost turning in the middle of a job, he had to find out today was the exact day that the house runs out of tranquilizer, so he had to go fucking ask for some from Ortega, which means he owes the bitch. Then Jamie decides to finally turn in the middle of some stupid alley and lose his shit, which was expected, but then Mickey wasn’t fast enough to grab him resulting in him playing cops and robbers with a stupid fucking wolf for the whole day. Yep, just _no_.

Then Mandy decides that tonight was a good time to argue for her cause of _let’s tell Ian everything_ , instead of helping the fuck out, which was just extra great. 

“I’m so done,” Mickey says to himself after the short reflection of his day. But his mind thinks that for some reason it’s a good idea to think about a certain redhead’s throat pressed against his arm, bold green eyes staring back at him like a challenge, and _fuck_ did he love a challenge. 

“I’m done,” he repeats to his thoughts willing it to just shut off and act as tired as he feels. Then again, apparently not listening to him is something that literally everyone in his life likes to do, including himself. So that night Mickey falls asleep with a touch of Red on his thoughts. 

-

“I know you’re freaked out about last night,” Mandy starts, staring straight into Ian’s eyes, as they were chilling in the Gallagher home’s couch. 

“Well shit I’m freaked out, no one told me the Milkovich house decided to get a huge violent as fuck dog,” Ian interrupts before Mandy could start to explain herself. An unreadable look left Mandy’s face as soon as it appeared. The she sighs. “You are so lucky you’re cute.” 

“The fuck does that mean?” Ian says, mocking offense. Sure, he’s not the smartest Gallagher around, but he’s not a complete idiot either. He knows there’s something she can’t tell him so he’ll let it pass and play dumb for now. 

“You know what, never mind,” Mandy says after a while and grabs Ian’s arm as she gets up from the couch. She looks straight into his eyes again, “I’m sorry.”

Ian gives her an understanding look. There is a lot more in that apology than Mandy would ever admit. To Ian it sounds more like _I’m sorry that I can’t tell you right now_ , or _sorry for my fucked up family_. All of which are thoughts Ian understood so probably acting stupid for a while isn’t gonna hurt anyone. He’ll do it for Mandy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tell me your favorite parts of the fic!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heyya! here's chapter 3...  
> Hope you guys enjoy!

“Hey Mickey,” Ian greets from behind the cash register. He’s noticed that Mickey’s been acting civil in Kash ’n Grab lately. It’s kind of like a fucked up form of hush money, he thinks.

“Yo,” Mickey replies shortly pouring in the stuff he’d usually jack; some gatorade, doritos, and snicker bars. He sneaks a look at Ian, which Ian doesn’t understand the meaning of and definitely pretends not to notice. 

“It’s rare, seeing you without the whole Milkovich clan on your back,” Ian says, trying to fill in the silence between them as he checks out the items on the counter. He sneaks a peak at the older boy, surprised to find him looking slightly uneasy- if his sudden fidgeting was anything to go by. Ian quickly darts his gaze back down to checking out the items in front of him when Mickey eyes finally looks to him. Mickey doesn’t reply, he just glares back at Ian as if daring him to ask more questions. Ian doesn’t make eye contact with him. 

“Thanks for comin’ by,” Ian finally says, putting all the items into a bag. 

“Came for these,” Mickey shrugs, his previous hostility gone as he grabs his stuff from Ian’s hands. What he said could be mildly translated as, _didn’t come for you._

“Appreciate it anyways,” Ian replies with a tight smile. Mickey raises his brows at him. He finds that the older boy does that a lot to him. After another moment of silence, he sees Mickey’s face break into a small, mischievous smile, “You need to get laid, fuckface.”

With that, he leaves the store, leaving Ian blushing to his ears. 

“What the fuck,” he mutters to himself, rubbing the back of his neck. 

_...the fuck was that for?_ Ian thinks to himself a moment after that, surprised to catch himself smirking at the air. He can’t be happy about the possibility that Mickey is paying special attention to him… _right?_

He shakes his head, telling himself to get a grip. He also mentally lists the few reasons coming on to Mickey would be a bad idea for good measure 1) Mandy would be pissed, 2) Mickey might possibly shoot him, 3) Fiona would be crazy pissed, 4) Mickey is 99.9 million percent straight 5) oh right, Mandy might decide to join Mickey in shooting his head off because Mickey is almost definitely straight. He thinks that he’s doing a good job listing reasons not to make a move on Mickey until he catches himself also listing counter arguments to his previous points 1) Mandy would eventually forgive him 2) Mickey might miss the shot and maybe he’ll forgive Ian? 3) When did Fiona ever matter in his choice of dating partners? 4) there is still a nano percent chance that Mickey might be gay 5) They might both miss and let him go… _maybe._

He realizes that he’s pushing it quite a bit with his fifth point. When did he ever negotiate with common sense? Oh right, he’s “dating” Kash. _Way to go, common sense. Thanks for being absent my whole fucking life._

“Hey,” he feels a hand grab his shoulder, dragging him back to reality, “Are you alright there?”

He nods slowly at Kash. The older man’s been paying extra attention to him lately, even more than usual. Ian guesses that it’s something to do with him not being into sex lately. Ian shrugs him off his shoulders and moves back. 

“I’m fine,” he says with finality, making it clear that he isn’t in the mood to talk, or look at Kash. He senses the older man’s wounded look without even seeing it. When he continues to daze off into nothing, Kash gives up and leaves to the back. _Well that’s that._

After his shift ends, which seemed like forever later, he packs his stuff and puts on his coat to leave. 

“Ian,” a familiar voice calls from outside. Ian peeks out the back to find Carl holding a skateboard that’s probably not his. 

“What is it?” he says, getting out. 

“Don’t come home tonight,” Carl says with a mischievous smirk at the end. 

“What?” Ian asks, “the fuck are you up to this time?”

“My friends are coming over,” Carl shrugs, and Ian looks at him skeptically. There are a whole host of reasons why he shouldn’t trust Carl. And even more reasons why Carl wouldn’t have “friends”.

“Alright,” he gives in, knowing that him being home would probably not stop his brother from doing whatever he’ll do, “but I want the house in one piece when I come back tomorrow.” 

“I got it,” Carl beams at him and drops his skateboard skating away before Ian could say anything else. He sighs. _Guess I’m staying over at the Milkovich’s tonight._

Then he remembers what happened the last time he visited the Milkovich house and reconsiders the option. He decides that he’ll ask Mandy later, and she can tell him then whether it’s okay or not. If how Mickey acted just now was anything to go by, it should be fine, right?

What happens later is that he _does_ bump into Mandy on his way out of Kash and Grab, and apparently it is okay for him to spend the night.

“It’s not like you’ve never spent the night anyways,” Mandy shrugs, when he asks if it was okay. Ian decides that he probably shouldn’t bring up what happened the last time he came over and just accept the favor. 

That’s how he finds himself walking over to the Milkovich house with Mandy, since he didn’t really have anything better to do after work anyways. As soon as they enter the house, they were met with a Mickey slovenly laying across the couch with nothing but boxers on, lazily switching through channels. 

“What the fuck Mick?” Mandy spits at her brother, visibly grossed out, “where’s everyone else?”

“Jail, jail, weed, job, I dunno Mands. I look like a tracker to you?” Mickey spits back. Mandy throws back a middle finger to him. He seems hardly surprised by Ian’s presence in the house, ignoring the two of them as they walk up to Mandy’s room. 

They spend the rest of the night chatting away as usual, Ian occasionally reading a book while Mandy continues to talk her head off. There was a moment where they talked about Ian and him coming out. It was kind of expected since he did turn her down after all. 

“So, you’re like, gay?” Mandy asks.

“Well yeah,” Ian replies, “that’s what I said.”

“How come you never told me before?” Mandy asks again.

“Well, it’s Southside. It’s not like I just go around advertising that I suck cock,” Ian replies, rolling his eyes. 

“I guess,” Mandy shrugs, then continues, “You got a boyfriend or something?”

Ian pauses for a minute, considering his options. 

“Someone I’m fucking? Yeah, I guess,” Ian replies, figuring that Mandy’ll probably find out anyways. He really doesn’t consider Kash his “boyfriend” at all is the important part that she probably needs to know. Mandy looks at him with an eyebrow slightly raised, probably considering whether or not to ask who, but then shrugs it off.

“You got anyone you like?” she asks instead. 

“No,” Ian says honestly. 

“At all?” Mandy eyes him skeptically.

“Nope, none at all,” he replies. He’d thought that he liked Kash for a while, but now that he thinks back on it, it’s probably a childish infatuation developed because of the excitement. 

“Tell me if you do,” Mandy tells him and leaves it at that. The two of them soon doze off on Mandy’s bed. Not quite in a sleeping position, but close enough. 

Ian fell asleep in an uncomfortable enough position for him to wake up after a few hours with a sore neck. He gets out of the bed to stretch and maybe grab a glass of water. Figuring that it’s kind of impossible to make Mandy move at this point, he’ll just spend the night on the couch. If he’s lucky, Mickey would be done with the couch by now. He opens the door as quietly as he can and finds that it’s quite chilly outside of the room. There’s no television noise, so the couch should be free for him. As he tries to walk down quietly, he spots an open window with cold air breezing inside the house and shivers a little. Ian walks over to the window to close it. _Because fuck, it’s cold as shit._

When he leans out to grab the ledge, he notices a dark spot at the corner of his eye. Maybe he’s still half asleep, but what he sees when he focuses on the dark spot wakes him up, gasping a sharp breath. There is huge looking hound, just sitting almost idly, half leaning to the wall of the house while staring at the sky. It has an almost silky coat of fur, gleaming in the moonlight, occasionally bristling with the wind. His memory of the last night is quite hazy, but he’s pretty sure that this is a different hound than the one with Mandy last time. 

Ian didn’t even realize he was holding his breath until the hound gets up and turns to look at him, unfazed by his presence on the window. They share eye contact for a moment before he staggers back, positive that it’s some kind of threat. 

_… go away…_

Ian blinks. Did he imagine that voice? 

He just stares dumbly out the window. The hound looks back at him and lets out a slow growl. He doesn’t realize the hound’s closeness until it’s standing right below him. He couldn’t react fast enough before he feels fur brushing against his hand holding the window ledge as it jumps up to a small stool outside the window. It looks at him again.

_… go. back. up…_

This time, Ian reacts. He staggers back again and scrambles up through the stairs, sprinting for his life. _Holy shit, that was too fucking close._

He closes the door to Mandy’s room behind him, panting hard and panicking. _Fuck, what if it comes in? Ian, you fucking idiot why didn’t you close the window. Now everyone in this house is gonna be dog food. Fuck, fuck, fu-_

“Ian?” Mandy stirs from her sleep, probably woken up by the sound of the banging door, “where did you go?”

“Uhm, Mands? Do you by any chance, get another dog? If you’re gonna say you don’t, I’m gonna piss myself,” Ian says in a high pitched voice. That seem to completely wake Mandy up.

“What?” she asks, on full alert. 

“Brown really fucking huge dog downstairs,” Ian explains frantically, feeling like it’ll come for him anytime now, “window was open, couldn’t close it. It might be inside the house. Fuck.”

“Jesus christ,” Mandy says, looking very pissed and immediately getting up. She kicks him aside from the door and stomps her way down the stairs.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea!” Ian raises his voice, but going after her anyways because Mandy is crazy and is about to get them killed. When they arrive at the living room, the window is still open, a cold breeze blowing in. Mandy continues to stomp her way to the window. She leans out.

“What the fuck, Mick?” she screams out the window. Ian catches up behind her and sees the the hound again in its original position. Its ears perk up at Mandy’s voice and it gets up sluggishly.

“Mands-“ Ian couldn’t finish.

“Is this your fucking idea of keeping a secret? Freaking Ian out?” she screams at the dog, “Get the fuck in, right now!”

The huge as dog immediately jumps through the window pushing Mandy to the ground and landing on top of her, growling. _Holy fuck, Mandy’s gonna die and I’m next._

“Mandy!” Ian says, but was met with a glare from her.

“Shut the fuck up Ian,” she orders and pushing the dog from her, “and you get the fuck away from me.”

Weirdly enough the dog complies, and slowly moves back, growling disapprovingly. Mandy gets up and crosses her arms.

“Close the goddamn window,” she tells Ian, which Ian does and she looks back at the dog, “turn back, right now.”

The dog stands still.

“Mick, I swear to god if you don’t turn back right now,” she warns and the dog, sighs? 

“Mandy,” Ian calls out, now absolutely positive that she’s insane. Ian’s more that 99% sure that the dog’s not Mickey, unless they share the same name, which he doesn’t think Mickey would approve of at all. The other 1% of him is insane and he sure as hell doesn’t wanna recognize it. So he states the obvious. “That’s not Mickey.”

“Is it now?” Mandy replies snappily. The dog ducks his head and drags himself to the other side of the living room with a sofa blocking his and Mandy’s view of it. Ian hears a disgusting set of noises then, what he could only assume is the sound of breaking bones, and a disapproving grunt finished with a barely audible “Fuck.” Then he hears the sound of shuffling and a loud groan before a familiar figure emerges from behind the sofa, pulling his boxers up.

“Mickey?” Ian inhales a breath. Because, _what in the actual fuck?_ He’s kind of sure that his brain is slightly off and it’s fucking with his vision. The other option would be that he’s dreaming, but it feels way too real for it to be something he can conjure out of his imagination alone. So he sticks with his brain finally giving the fuck up on him. _Damn it brain, would it hurt to try a little harder?_

“Jesus christ, Mandy,” Mickey lets out while in the process of cracking every joint in his body. He glares at the two of them. “What did I tell you?”

“This one’s your fault,” Mandy spits at him, “Now we get to explain to Ian.”

“Not _we. You_ explain,” Mickey replies in a less than friendly tone, “Like shit I’ll be sitting up explaining fuck all to _your_ friend. Shit, I’ll bet you had him over so he could catch me.” 

“Excuse you? You were the one who had the nerve to turn all you fucking wanted when someone’s in the house,” Mandy replies.

“Didn’t tell me he was staying over,” Mickey shrugs, an annoyed expression visible on his face.

“Like shit you didn’t know,” Mandy says, “you just can’t be fucked to change up your routine for once.”

“Uh, are you guys fucking with me? ‘Cuz if you are, it worked,” Ian jumps in the conversation before it could get any more unreal. 

“I look like I fuck around, Gallagher?” Mickey raises an eyebrow at him threateningly. If it was any other time, Ian would bite back with a smart ass comment about how Mickey’s body consists of sixty percent water and one hundred and ten percent sarcasm and bitch remarks. But he’s currently confused as fuck so he’ll save that for next time, _if he gets the chance._

Mickey grabs a shirt from the couch and turns around to go up the stairs to his room, leaving him and Mandy alone in the living room. It feels kind of awkward like it almost never is with the two of them, until Mandy decides to pounce the couch. 

“So are you up for some story telling or what?” Mandy asks, almost giddy. 

-

Mickey goes up to his room scratching his head almost furiously. He doesn’t really know what he was thinking earlier. Mandy was right, it was his fault. Changing tonight wasn’t a good idea at all and he knew it. After all, his brain capacity is to an extent reduced to that of a wolf’s whenever he turns. It’s ridiculously confining being in the brain of an animal but he’s had time to adjust. Usually he could only barely make out Mandy’s voice since she’s the only person to put effort into talking to him in wolf form. She’s also a werewolf - _god, it sounds so idiotic actually calling themselves that_ \- which more or less comes with some of its perks. 

The panic arrives after his first cigarette, when it finally dawns on him that someone knows, _actually knows_ , about the big secret. Usually the panic would cause him to go on a frenzy hunting down whoever the fuck found out, but he’s figured out for a while that it’s really different when it’s Mandy’s best friend, specifically this one, since she seems so damn adamant about this one. By the end of his fifth cigarette, he figures out that his only two options are to either kill off this best friend and get killed off by Mandy, or let the boy walk and hope to hell that he can keep a secret. Mickey isn’t good at hoping. 

So instead, he opens up his window, figuring that he’ll just have to burn off the panic and stress in his system. He turns real quick, barely feeling the pain of his rearranging bones anymore, before jumping out from his window, landing perfectly on the ground with an almost soundless thud and sets off. He’ll make sure to remind Mandy later to not tell Iggy about this since, that specific brother has a few screws loose and would probably use it as an excuse to make a mess. It’s kind of adding to his stress to think about it so he decides to do otherwise and go for a run and making an effort to think about everything else. 

He had been going through a few troublesome years before Terry was sent to prison for good around this time last year. Honest to god, he doesn’t know why the Milkovich family even managed to reach such high numbers. His parents have got to be crazy or just simply careless to be popping out one baby after another without actually thinking about the fucked up genes creating fucked up kids. He’s got a hunch it’s for the welfare but who fucking knows? Although he doubts he or any of his brothers would turn out any less fucked up even if they had been normal kids, at least they’d be able to go to a hospital without causing a fucking scene. Props to his mom for giving birth in the fucking house all six fucking times and living through that. Ironically enough, she died overdosing on morphine, probably because she’s had enough of all the fucking yelling in the house on top of having to take care of six little halfies (what he calls half werewolves) running around. Despite it happening ages ago, Mickey still has mixed feelings about his mom dying. On one hand, he still holds it against her for leaving him to deal with all this shit, but on the other, he finds himself feeling a little thankful that she’d died long enough that Mandy can’t really remember her and that he could learn to deal with all of this by himself from an early age - _no fucking thanks to his brothers._

The wolf genes came from his mom, which he thanks the fucking gods for, because if Terry had been a fucking wolf too, the world would’ve been a much shittier place for them. But because he wasn’t, Mickey and his siblings, Mandy included, overpowered him from a young age. It didn’t stop him from terrorizing them from a young age, but it gave them the option of fighting back if they wanted to. For some stupid reason out there, none of them ever did, but having that option - at least to him - was what saved him from completely bending to all of it. He’d read in a book somewhere that it had to do with conditioning or whatever. Not that he really gives a fuck anymore since Terry’s gone for good. 

Mickey’s paws feels slightly chilled from stepping on ice and snow, but not at an uncomfortable level so he keeps on running down into the woods, only stopping once he’s cooled his brains. Honestly, wolf brain is really useful for cooling down. He’s found out dogs don’t really think much and everything becomes simple in his brain so it becomes all fine and dandy. He finds himself in a familiar part of the woods and sniffs around before curling himself into a ball and closing his eyes focusing on all his other senses other than his sight. He might go hunting, he might sleep, or he might run again soon. _Who knows?_

**Author's Note:**

> Please tell me if you guys like it and want me to continue!


End file.
